


What He Left Behind

by cactipresident



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Brother-Sister Relationships, Child Neglect, Dissociation, Eating Disorders, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Sorry Not Sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-11
Updated: 2015-10-11
Packaged: 2018-04-25 23:32:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4981024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cactipresident/pseuds/cactipresident
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick is gone. The smiths are gone too for all intents and purposes. Whats left is nearly unrecognizable as a family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What He Left Behind

**Author's Note:**

> Awh man I am so sorry

He shouldn’t feel the stab of disappointment when the garage is just as he left it, empty.

He shouldn’t feel the flicker of hope he didn't realize he was holding burn out as it did every day he returned home from school.

He shouldn’t feel like grabbing the flask placed on the table in the cold unfeeling garage, it’s amber contents luring him into a false sense of okay.

He shouldn’t feel like just running away from everything, a simple walk to the intergalactic station onto some unknown spaceship that would take him to some unknown planet.

He shouldn’t feel like crying, his tears used up in the dead of the night when he tried to pretend he couldn’t hear his mother do the exact same a room over.

He shouldn’t feel a lot of things but Morty managed to feel them all the same, each with the intensity as the first time they ripped through him. With little ceremony he reached out for the cold silver, the feeling becoming familiar in his hand. He heard the contents move with him, the quiet sloshing of it against the inside. His nimble fingers twisted off the cap with practiced ease he shouldn’t have.

He wondered if _he_ was this young when he started drinking. His mother said from what she could remember of her childhood he had been drunk for most of it, his incessant burping and slurring a common and welcomed sound. She didn’t seems to think of it that way when morty filled the gap in noise he had left though she said nothing, opting to instead to hide in her room and ignore him till he passed out.

That was all they seemed to do these days.

His dad would go to work with a smile, come home late and ignore everyone’s sad faces to try to talk them all up with his future. Summer would barely eat, her figure diminishing to the point where she took to only wearing clothes so no one could question her severe weight loss. Not that they did, they ignored, they pretended it wasn’t happening. The Smiths were especially good at not acknowledging each other.  His mom would go through the motions of a dutiful mom and wife, till Morty began drinking. That was when she knew the only way she could pretend it wasn’t happening was to be in her room. The family ignored the sobs and the quickly disappearing wine, they all knew Morty drank whatever _he_ had stored in his bunker.

Most of all the Smith’s ignored the loss of _him._

The had to pretend they didn’t miss the drunk traitor to the galaxy. Inter-galactic police were less suspicious that way and it made it all easier. Easier to convince them he left them -kidnapped them and let them go, the officer told them, how lucky they were - and they had no idea where he was. Easier to ignore the stabs of pain.

Or at least that’s what they tried to tell themselves, morty laughed to himself. He knew they all felt it and the more they pretended they didn’t the worse it got. The only one okay with his loss was Jerry, the smile on his face almost never leaving. He honestly thought they were better off, and maybe they were. Morty couldn’t tell, the solution of alcohol already burning whatever sense of reality he had.

Maybe it was better that Morty wasn’t almost dying everyday, or failing his classes due to late night excursions. Maybe it was better for the bandaid to be ripped from his mother, the uncertainty in everything she had to do gone. Maybe it was better Summer wouldn’t have to  risk herself as well, slightly more dangerous as /he/ tried to protect her from the obvious not deadly dangers of space and the world in general. Maybe it was better for his dad to not have to stress himself with whether or not his children would return alive or undamaged.

Maybe it was better none of them felt alive anymore.

He ignored the wet trails down his face, letting them follow familiar tracts they knew all too well. His head titled back, the liquid moving to conform to gravity as he gulped down more of the burning liquid. The pain was welcomed. It helped some, not enough to get rid of what he wanted but enough to dull it just a bit to be managed.

Morty tried not to flinch at the sound of the front door slamming echoing through the bare garage. The sound signalled Summer coming home, her voice devoid of much emotion engaging their mother in some form of a conversation. His eyes closed softly, a sigh escaping his lips as he moved to sit in one of _his_ chairs.

The cold back bit into his skin but he ignored it. Just pretended it wasn’t him in the chair toying with some half finished invention Ri- _he_ left behind. Disassociating with his reality had become a bit too easy though the thought didn’t make him stop. He liked feeling as if he was viewing the world from the outside, as if all his pain was merely the pain of some tv show character him and summer had bonded over.

There was a light knock on the door, the tell tale hesitation showing she never truly acknowledged the once imposing presence being gone. She seemed to think _he’d_ appear and yell at her again, probably to tell her it was too warm to slip herself into the sweatshirt three times her size- though it was most likely around five times now, if the glimpse of her ribs he caught one day was any indication.

Morty felt his head turn in greeting, some of the alcohol he was trying to drink spill from his mouth. He watched with detached apathy as her eyes grew wide, knowing he liked too much like _him_

“Morty…” It was like a sigh from her lips, her eyes shining with unshed tears. The words spoke more than she actually said. _I’m sorry. What became of us. We’re dying_

He just turned his eyes from her’s in response.   _I don’t care_

__

He heard her steps echoing dimly across the hard concrete floor towards him. He was fighting to go back to his own world. He had to ignore, he had to pretend. He tried not to move in shock as her arms wrapped around him. He tried not to feel how thin her arms were, like sticks trying to wrap him up.

Her face was buried in his hair, sniffling and trying to hold herself back like they had gotten used to. It was too much. Too much trying not enough doing.

Morty gripped her back, both of them trying to convey how much they hurt but how much they loved too. How much they hurt for each other. He somehow fell from his chair, both of them falling to the floor in a crying mass, just hugging each other. He felt his small buzz from the alcohol wear off, his pain in all it’s bare glory before him, nothing was shielding him from ignoring it any longer.

He heard a sob break through the room before realizing it was from him. It sounded broken and hurt like nothing would fix it. Summer just held him tighter, pulling him closer if it was even possible. He clutched her back, staining her grey sweatshirt a darker color.

“W-why?”

She didn’t need to ask for clarification, she knew what he was asking even if he didn’t. Why did he leave? Why didn’t he care? Why didn’t they care? Why did they fall apart so easily without him?

Summer pet his hair, trying to soothe him as she left his question unanswered. She wanted to know as well, he knew. No one knew why he left them again. Morty had an inkling that he was once again trying to save his own ass, screw whoever got caught in the crosshairs.

He himself said caring didnt help anyone. It didn’t help bird person. It didn’t help the smiths.

Morty leaned into Summer,gripping her sweatshirt behind her tight. His tears were starting to run out, her own breaths began to even out from the hysterical state they found themselves in. He hoped that they could just stay comforting each other, brother and sister surviving against the harsh world that sought to drown them. He knew it would have to end, but he grew so used to ignoring things he decided to ignore time.

“Summer…” He called softly, her hands still playing through his brown curls. She hummed in response, letting him known he could continue, she was listening.

“ I think he left because of me.” For her part summer’s hands stilled for a second before continuing in their comforting.

“ What do you mean?” She tried to hide it but he heard the crack in her voice.

“I convinced him to go to the wedding. I told him to support his best friend. I told him to open up. I hurt him” His own voice was wavering with emotions he tried to quiet with an endless supply of alcohol. “ I let him leave , Summer! I-I watched him go… He tried… He tried to tell me it was a bad idea…” He trailed off, playing with the soft fabric of his sister’s sweatshirt, the ends were frayed just enough for him to pull a bit of string from it. He stared at the grey string, playing with it between his fingers.

Summer stayed silent, her hands still playing with his hair. He assumed she gained some comfort from it as well otherwise she would have stopped. He felt her take in a deep breath, her heart beating out a comforting rhythm against his ear. If his own mind wasn’t racing through all the emotions he had tried so desperately to repress he might have fallen asleep against her. He never knew his big sister to be a comforting presence but at this moment he wouldn’t give up the safety of her arms for a second.

“We all knew… We all knew he was going to leave, Morty…” When she finally spoke it broke him out of an almost trance like state. He thought she was going to let it go, to ignore his outburst and just hold him like he held her.

The younger sibling pushed away for a moment, shifting himself to get more comfortable on the unforgiving floor. She allowed it, not speaking another word till he stilled. “It was only a matter of time. I know we all thought we could change it… Mom especially...  but we knew him. Too well.”

Morty let her words wash over him not doing a thing to ease the heavy weight of guilt settling within him. If anything they burdened the load. He didn’t know. He thought it was going to be them together. Forever and ever.

If he knew would he have pushed less? He tried to shake the question from his mind but it stayed chewing its way through any other thought making it’s way across his mind.

“I miss Grandpa Rick.”

It was the first time he let himself say his name. The very name hung heavy between the two siblings lost in grief. The drunk scientist taught them too much, took too much from them in his inevitable departure. Not their innocence, they had lost that particular part of their being long before Rick stumbled his way into their house. He took their trust, their ability to love unconditionally knowing the person they put their heart into could just get up and leave.

He taught them to never give anyone power over you like that. It was too dangerous to trust and to love.  He proved that when he took the ship away from their tiny planet they camped on.

“Me too.”

And despite all that they still loved him. They still wished he never left their broken life.

Morty gave a broken laugh, the sound making Summer flinch for a second, her hands flying from his hair to his shoulders. He continued laughing the noise sounding wrong against his ears. The insane laughter quickly broke down to sobs, he buried himself back into the warmth of Summer, her arms cradling him close even if she didn’t understand fully what was happening.

“ God, h-he fucked us up good.” He got out between the tear stained gasps of breaths. He felt her smile sadly against him.

 **  
**“Yea. Yea he fucked us up good.”

**Author's Note:**

> Ah poor morty and summer.
> 
> If they only knew what rick did maybe they'd be less hard on themselves.


End file.
